South Dakota Redemption Period for Tax Sales

The short answer

Open until a tax deed issues; a deed cannot be sought until 3 years after the certificate sale, and redemption then runs until 60 days after completed service of the notice of intention

South Dakota runs 6 different redemption windows

Which one applies is decided by the parcel, not by the state, so read the condition before trusting the headline figure.

South Dakota redemption windows by parcel condition
When it applies	How long	After the sale
Certificate bought by a private purchaser at the third Monday in December sale, in a county whose commissioners have waived SDCL 10-23-28.1. This is the ordinary investor case.The practical outer limit is the certificate's own life: proceedings must be commenced within 6 years of the sale and completed within 6 months after that, or the certificate and the lien for subsequent taxes are cancelled and forever barred.SDCL 10-24-1; 10-25-1; 10-25-8	No fixed deadline. Redemption stays open until a tax deed issues, and the holder cannot start the deed process until 3 years after the sale, then must let 60 days run from completed service of the notice of intention.	None. Once the sixty days from completed service expire without redemption, all right, title and interest of the owner, mortgagee and lienholders passes to the certificate holder.
Certificate bid off in the name of the county because no bidder took it, or because the county has not adopted a SDCL 10-23-28.1 waiver resolution and therefore holds every certificate it issues.Redeeming here means paying all delinquent taxes with penalty and interest to the date of redemption plus the costs of advertising and selling the certificate. The county certificate itself earns the Category G rate, five-sixths of one percent per month or fraction of a month. A person may also pay one or more years of subsequent taxes without redeeming in full, which does not cut off the county's lien.SDCL 10-23-24; 10-23-25; 10-24-5; 10-24-6; 10-25-17	No fixed deadline, and no outer limit either. Redemption runs until the county takes a tax deed, and the six-year limitation that cancels a private holder's certificate does not apply to a certificate held by the county.	None once the county's own notice of intention has run its sixty days.
Certificate assigned to a purchaser by the county when the certificate was already more than four years old on the date of the assignment.All taxes on the property, including taxes due but not yet delinquent, must be paid in full before the county can assign the certificate, so the assignee's entry price is the whole tax history rather than one year.SDCL 10-23-27; 10-23-28; 10-25-17; 10-25-18	No fixed redemption deadline, but the purchaser has only 1 year from the date of assignment to commence the deed proceeding and 6 months after that year to complete it, so the redemption window closes on that faster clock.	None after the sixty days from completed service expire.
Owner who is a minor, or who has been adjudged incompetent, holding an interest in a parcel sold for taxes.The statute also preserves partition proceedings by the tax deed holder or the holder's successor as to any certificate in which a minor or a person under disability has an interest.SDCL 10-24-3	1 year after the minor reaches the age of eighteen, or 1 year after the person is adjudged competent, whichever applies. This can outlast the tax deed, so a title taken over such an interest is not quiet.	This right survives the sale and, on its face, the deed; the statute measures it from the end of the disability rather than from the sale.
Certificate sold for delinquent municipal special assessments certified to the county treasurer, rather than for delinquent property taxes.The sale is conducted in the same manner, at the same time and in the same location as the sale for delinquent property taxes. An unredeemed special assessment certificate is re-entered on the duplicate tax lists each year with interest added at the Category G rate.SDCL 10-23-1; 10-23-10; 10-23-23	The same as an ordinary tax certificate. The owner has the same length of time to redeem and is entitled to the same notice before a deed can issue.	None. The special assessment certificate follows the ordinary tax certificate rules.
Homestead worth less than one hundred seventy thousand dollars occupied by a person seventy years of age or older, or by that person's unremarried surviving spouse, for as long as it keeps the character of a homestead.This is an absence of any sale, not a redemption tier of zero days. The owner has to tell the treasurer before the sale that the home is occupied and that the age requirement is met, and an owner who fails to give that notice is responsible for the costs of the sale of the certificate and for the taxes and interest on it.SDCL 43-31-1; 10-23-7; 10-23-2.5	No redemption question arises, because the property is exempt from sale for taxes altogether and no certificate should be offered on it.	Not applicable. There is no sale to redeem from.

How the clock works

There is no fixed redemption deadline that starts at the sale. SDCL 10-24-1 lets any person redeem at any time before a tax deed is issued. What sets the outer limit is the deed process: SDCL 10-25-1 bars the certificate holder from starting that process until three years after the certificate sale, and SDCL 10-25-8 keeps the right to redeem alive until sixty days after the affidavit of completed service of the notice of intention is filed with the treasurer. Missing that sixty-day window passes the owner's, mortgagee's and lienholder's interests to the certificate holder. After the deed is recorded, the former owner has one hundred eighty days to bring an action to recover possession or to avoid the deed, which is a limitation period rather than a further right to redeem.

Who can redeem

Any person may redeem, including the owner, anyone acting for the owner, and a disinterested third party, though a disinterested person who pays gains no lien on the property and no claim against the owner or lienholders. A lienholder may redeem or pay the delinquent taxes and add the amount to the lien. A person adjudged incompetent may redeem within one year after being adjudged competent, and a minor within one year after turning eighteen.

What the owner pays to redeem

The sum listed in the tax certificate, plus interest on that sum at the rate the certificate sold for, running from the date of purchase, plus other taxes the holder paid later with interest at the same rate. Where the deed process has begun and the treasurer received written notice and a verified statement of costs before the redemption, the costs of serving the notice of intention are added, including publication, the affidavit, the records search, locating owners and attorney fees, all capped together at four hundred dollars. No fee may be charged for the redemption itself. A certificate the county bid off is redeemed by paying all delinquent taxes with penalty and interest to the date of redemption plus the costs of advertising and selling the certificate.

How your interest accrues

The certificate earns the annual rate named in the winning bid, running from the date of purchase on the whole sum shown on the certificate, which is the taxes, interest and costs the buyer paid. Taxes for other years that the holder pays are added to the certificate and carry the same lien, though SDCL 10-23-22 provides that a subsequent tax payment does not bear interest until the date that tax itself became delinquent. A certificate the treasurer bids off in the county's name earns the Category G rate instead, five-sixths of one percent per month or fraction of a month. On redemption of a certificate held by anyone other than the county, a fee set by county commission resolution and capped at fifty dollars is deducted from the proceeds paid to the holder; the statute bars charging that fee to the property owner. The treasurer also collects ten dollars for each certificate.

Why some certificates are bid to zero

SDCL 10-23-8 caps a valid bid at ten percent per year and states no lower limit, so nothing in the statute stops a bid of zero percent and no minimum return is guaranteed. The price never moves: every bidder pays the same full amount of taxes, interest and costs due, and the only variable is the rate, so a premium cannot exist here. Read the December sale carefully before treating it as an investor auction. SDCL 10-23-28.1 forbids a county to sell any tax certificate unless the board of county commissioners has adopted a resolution waiving that prohibition, and provides that the county shall be the holder of any certificate the county issues where no such resolution exists. In that posture the treasurer still publishes the notice, still holds the sale on the third Monday of December, and then bids the certificate off in the county's name under SDCL 10-23-24, which produces no investor purchase at all. Because the date is fixed by statute it is the recurring tax-sale event a South Dakota county calendar is most likely to carry, which is why it gets mistaken for an open auction. Confirm with the county treasurer whether a waiver resolution is in force before planning around it.

What happens when it ends

South Dakota holds no annual tax deed auction. The deed step begins with a tax certificate. No sooner than three years and no later than six years after the certificate sale, the holder serves a notice of intention to take a tax deed on the owner of record, the person in possession, the person in whose name the property is taxed, any mortgagee, and any lienholder, creditor of record or other interested person shown in the register of deeds, treasurer or clerk of courts records. Sixty days after the affidavit of completed service is filed with the treasurer, the right to redeem ends and the treasurer prepares the deed. Because SDCL 10-23-28.1 leaves the county holding the certificate in any county that has not passed a waiver resolution, the county is usually the party that takes the deed. Since February 12, 2024, SDCL 10-25-39.1 has required a county that acquires property by tax deed to declare it surplus and sell it within one year, and that sale is the event an outside bidder can actually bid at. It is scheduled parcel by parcel rather than on a fixed annual date.

A redeemed certificate, plus your accrued interest, is what makes the wait profitable; see how redemption periods work across states. An unredeemed certificate is instead your path to the property through a tax deed sale, which still does not convey marketable title on its own, so budget for a quiet title action.

Verified Aug 27, 2026 against South Dakota statutes.

Tax Sale Atlas publishes educational information about public tax sale processes. This is not legal, financial, or investment advice. Rules, dates, and fees change; confirm with the county office before you bid.

South Dakota redemption period